1. Team X-Treme Breaks Into The Forest
(Requested, Or Rather, Demanded by Alecia)

One listless Saturday night in the 2000th year of our Bored, Team X-Treme and friends violated the sanctity of Nature. But it was for a good cause.

Dan R., Alan, Garrett, and I were spending another quiet weekend at Garrett's house. There wasn't much to do anywhere in our desolate desert town that night so we decided to get something to eat. The lateness of the hour had whittled our options down to the usual fare: Filiberto's or IHOP. Neither sounded appealing.

Someone suggested we make sandwiches. Someone else suggested cigars. We almost attacked them for suggesting cigars when we were trying to decide what to eat.

Then someone suggested Flagstaff. We almost attacked that person as well. But it was too late. In a grand example of group-think, we decided that the only way to resolve the issue was to find a forest to eat sandwiches and smoke cigars in.

I don't remember anyone actually suggesting the bit about the forest, but it became an integral part of the plan nonetheless.

The only obstacle we were facing was the whole desert thing. There wasn't a forest in sight. But we knew where one was.

Flagstaff, in northern Arizona, was a mere 150 miles away. We had the time. We had the technology. Our collective dream was within our grasp.

We hit kind of a snag convincing Garrett to leave. He had a few reservations about leaving the city in the middle of the night without telling his girlfriend. After exerting the power of the Collective, we had him convinced that there is a 200 mile relationship radius that he could travel within at will without any possible repercussion. Heh heh, we could get that boy to do anything. (Sorry, Dana.)

Our Collective decided to take my car, since everyone else was tall and my car was the largest. The Collective then concluded that since it was my car I should be the one to drive it. Who was I to argue against the authority of the Collective?

We arrived in Flagstaff without incident. This was particularly impressive because collectively, we had no idea where we were really going.

The sun was rising gloriously over the mountains as we emerged from a 24-hour grocery store triumphantly bearing sandwich meats and other sandwich-related items. An earlier stop at a gas station to refuel had provided us with the finest Swisher Sweets our money could buy and still leave us enough to get fuel for the journey home. The Collective had decided that Dan R. (being the only one of us who was old enough to purchase tobacco,) should purchase the tobacco.

Thus equipped, we were lacking only one part of the equation: the forest. This was turning out to be more difficult than we had anticipated. There was plenty of fauna, sure, but there was also plenty of civilization. Houses, roads, telephone poles. The Collective felt that for this was inappropriate of a rugged, manly excursion such as ours. We also needed a place to park the car that wouldn't attract unwanted attention.

We found a winding road on the outskirts of the town that looked promising. There was only a smattering of houses and they were becoming scarcer and scarcer as we went on. Finally, we found a turn-off that seemed to lead into some decent forest. The Collective nodded in satisfaction.

Our satisfaction was short lived. Less than a hundred yards on our turn-off was a low gate across the road. It wasn't much to look at it; iron bars making two scalene right triangles whose points met in the middle of a road. A chain and a padlock held them fast. The Collective was bewildered. "Who locks up a forest?!"

A sign on the gate answered our question. "Closed Due To Severe Fire Hazard Conditions".

The Collective hung its head, defeated.

It was a good thing that the Collective had elected a member of Team X-Treme as the driver.

I began to creep the car forward. Unbeknownst to me, as I was doing so the rest of the Collective were all exchanging looks of exasperation.

The nose of my car tapped the gate and the lock and chain blew apart and flew off to the side of the road. The gate swung open reluctantly on rusty hinges that squealed in indignation.

There was much rejoicing among the Collective.

Alan ran out and closed the gate behind us. Almost as an afterthought, he grabbed the lock and chain and draped it over the gate. After he realized that it wasn't fooling anyone he brought it into the car as a souvenir.

Thus, we broke into the forest, made our sandwiches, and smoked our cigars.

I hadn't ever smoked a cigar before, or anything for that matter, so I mostly coughed and tried to look distinguished.

With full bellies and sour mouths we had left our forest to journey to our desert. The morning sun warmed us as we drove back towards Phoenix, back towards home. The rest of the Collective fell asleep on the way.

All things considered, not a bad Saturday night/Sunday morning.

Moral of the Story: If you're the one behind the wheel, screw the Collective.